Six Years
by Mister Saint
Summary: In an alternate universe, Avatar Aang is dead. It is the world according to Ozai, and everyone chafes beneath his rule-- including Azula. Six years later, Sokka will have the chance to resist the domination of the Fire Kingdom-- if he can survive.
1. Chapter 1: Of Kings and Queens

A gift fic for my honorary sis, The Writer Triumphant.

I'll warn you all up front; I'm not as familiar with Avatar as some people are. This is an AU Tokka piece.

Anyway, chapter one.

* * *

Chapter One: Of Kings and Queens

Revolution struck long after the world forgot how to turn. The seasons had lost track of who came before whom and who came next, and after a while no one cared anymore. Autumn reigned supreme; its throne a pile of crackling leaves, its roads the dusty grass of drought and its sky an ailing canopy drooling silt from a six-year-wildfire.

For Sokka, revolution came on just another morning. He awoke as always, aching from the straw and mud bed he shared with two Earth kingdom boys, rubbed the sleep from his eyes, and instantly regretted all of it. Every morning he opened his eyes to the bitter black clouds lurking over Ba Sing Se, churlish shapes that consumed and regurgitated each other a dozen times a day but never turned into anything else. He could see them through the windows.

Sokka hated those windows. Every day he squeezed his eyes tightly shut again, begged his heart to burst, and tried to will away his memories of a clear blue sky over the former Earth Kingdom capitol.

And every morning, Toph kicked him.

"Wake up you moron," she said for the eighteen-hundredth time. Sokka's breath burst from his lips, and he gasped to get it back. "Come on Snoozles," the Earthbender urged him. "I want to eat, and I don't want some other idiot sitting next to me at breakfast."

And as always, Sokka smiled just a little bit, and loved her that much more. If only Toph knew she had saved his life every single morning for six years—maybe then she would stop kicking him so hard.

It might help if she knew he loved her, though.

"I'm up," Sokka half-whined. "You have sharp feet. You should have that looked at before you stab someone."

Toph managed a smirk as she stepped away from the bed, listening carefully to the vibrations in the floor so she would know where to step. Sokka watched her, admired her for her grace, and wisely deduced that he would never be able to tell her just how graceful she looked to him.

As Sokka rose from bed, still clad in yesterday's faded blue tunic and rope belt (which looked suspiciously like the tunic from the day before that), he stretched his arms high above his head, yawning as loudly and obnoxiously as possible. Some of the other workers lifted their sunburned heads to stare daggers at him, but seeing Toph roll her eyes made the gesture perfectly worthwhile.

"Hurry up," she snapped, folding her arms over her own frayed, beige tunic. Sokka liked when she did that. Of course, at eighteen years old, Toph actually had breasts to emphasize with the gesture. A lot changes in six years.

Just as Sokka opened his mouth to formulate some sardonic comment, a pair of fully armored Fire Kingdom soldiers clattered into the bunkhouse. The noise drowned out everything: Sokka's smart remark, the sleepers' protests, and even the soldiers' own commands at first.

The workers filed into the aisle, standing at swaying attention—just as they did every other morning. Today, Sokka thought, is shaping up to be yesterday again.

"Listen up, pukes," growled one soldier, his voice muted and rattling from his Fire Kingdom mask. Sokka stood bolt upright next to Toph, having long ago lost his desire to be insubordinate. He listened.

"Today," roared the second soldier, "you all have the day off."

Silence crept through the bunkhouse with all the subtlety of a Toph-kick to the ribs. No one seemed to know what to say, how to react to such a ridiculous concept. A day off? Sokka barely knew what that phrase meant anymore.

"However," the first began, shifting a bit in his armor, "you will all be required to assemble for the arrival of Lord Ozai this afternoon. Princess Azula wants every last able-bodied worker to receive credit for the work you've all done in building her capitol here in Ba Sing Se."

The hush swelled, and overflowed.

"That is all," the second soldier shouted. "Breakfast in five minutes."

And bathed in the pounding clang of their own footsteps, the Fire soldiers marched into the grease-black day outside.

An eternity folded itself into one minute as the bunkhouse workers picked their jaws from the floor. Sheets rustled. Some sat, others paced. Some stood blinking in the light, Sokka among them.

"Well, this just sucks," Toph declared, again with folded arms. "I, for one, have no desire to see that overgrown matchbox come to goad his psycho daughter into sucking up."

"It's a day off, though," Sokka countered. "A day off! One day without having to chisel Azula's creepy face into a new door."

"Poor Snoozles," Toph said. "It must be super hard to _not_ have to lift thousands of pounds of rock around every day.'

Sokka never bothered putting on his boasting smile for Toph. She couldn't see it anyway, and he generally did not feel it, either. "It's not my fault I can't Earthbend.'

Toph let her arms fall to her sides. "I was kidding," she softly said, as if hoping the words would fail to reach his ears.

"I know," Sokka quickly assured her. He didn't know, but that lay beyond the point. "Let's get to breakfast, okay shrimp?"

Toph nodded, still staring her empty stare at nothing.

"Okay."

* * *

They could hear Fire Lord Ozai approaching Ba Sing Se long before his royal tank appeared over the horizon. Sokka would never forget the soulless grinding of that monstrosity's treads; the final blitzkrieg of Omashu had seen to that. He would always recall that cacophony as the herald of Aang's death—even if it had been Azula, and not Ozai, to do the deed.

Even now, as Sokka stood in the oddly coliseum-esque amphitheatre inside Azula's palace, he could smell the broken walls, the charred soil of that horrible day. Even with a belly full of passable food, and Toph standing next to him, he could feel the terrible pangs of hopelessness he felt when he watched Ozai's tank torch the school where the last of King Bumi's resistance had hidden.

Azula, too, seemed agitated by the grinding of that four-story mechanical plague. She sat directly across from Toph and Sokka, nestled firmly in the cushion of her VIP box seat. At her right hand, as ever, sat Mai—chained to the throne, dressed in the black lace Azula forced on all her concubines. Azula fiddled with Mai's chain, jerking it once in a while whenever her lips tightened into a scowl.

Sokka turned his eyes away, but, between Azula's magmatic stare and the acid-stinking gray of the sky, there weren't many better options.

So he looked at Toph.

Toph did not seem to notice.

After no less than half an hour, the rumbling of the royal tank ceased. Azula took her feet at last, leaving Mai alone, and turned her attention to the grand archway in front of the coliseum. Sokka tore his eyes away from Toph to look, too; just like a boat wreck, he found it next to impossible to keep from looking at Fire Lord Ozai. Whether this was due to morbid fascination or not, though, he could not say.

"All rise for our great King, Lord Ozai!" a herald called, his voice only just preceding two full columns of torch bearers. Clad in Fire Kingdom black armor, the bearers fanned along the walls of the amphitheater in perfect step, one after another. The formed a near-perfect ring around center stage.

Toph smirked. "It sounds like Ozai's still a drama queen."

Sokka grinned. A few others laughed. Most dared not respond.

Ozai's arrival took a solid thirty minutes. After much fanfare and ado, the Fire Lord himself emerged from the entry way. Caped, armored, and still youthful-looking despite the long scars on his face and neck-- a parting gift from Zuko-- Ozai commanded a menace and beauty that few men in all the world could match any more.

All in attendance bowed to him, except Azula. The Fire Princess stood firm on her platform, her own deep red cape billowing in the smoky breeze.

"Welcome to my new palace, Father," the princess cried over the arena. "How do you like the new Ba Sing Se?"

Ozai cast a long, ponderous gaze over the former Earth capitol, taking it in, turning to behold the slaves as well.

"It is a magnificent palace," he growled in answer, "but you had no business constructing such a place without my consent."

Sokka, who had been dozing, snapped suddenly awake.

Azula's expression remained unchanged, the same empty, broken stare she'd worn since murdering the Avatar six years ago.

"What do you mean, Father?"

"This is a capitol. This palace is not some getaway, Azula. This is a royal palace." Ozai folded his arms over his chest, a menacing stance if ever there was one.

"Of course it is," Azula shot back. "This is a queen's palace, father."

Sokka stared along with all the others. Queen's palace? _Queen's _palace?

"Surely you mean princess' palace, Azula," Ozai growled, a warning biting into his words.

Azula shook her head. She stepped off the box platform, descending on a pillars of flame as if they were a perfect staircase. Torch bearers scattered at the display. Sokka found himself gripping Toph's sleeve. Toph found herself needing that grip.

"Fire Lord Ozai," Azula shouted, and not a man or woman in all the worldwide Fire Kingdom dared to breathe. "I asked you here to show you what the people of this wretched Kingdom can still do. To show you that they are not destroyed, that they are strong. That they can thrive, even after six years of your oppression."

Ozai faced his daughter as she stepped to the ground in front of him. Stared at him, undaunted.

"Imagine," she hissed, a seductive, sly whisper, "what they could do under _my_ oppression. Father."

The world stood still.

"I challenge you to Agni Kai."


	2. Chapter 2: The Path of Heavy Metal

* * *

Chapter 2: The path of heavy metal

* * *

Ba Sing Se breathed in flickering gasps.

Sokka listened to Toph talking softly to herself. He thought he heard her praying. He though he heard her say, "Please let them kill each other," but he could not be sure. Perhaps he wanted her to say that.

"What makes you think you have the right to challenge me to Agni Kai?" Ozai demanded even as he removed his cloak and shirt. His bare chest, chiseled and splattered with pink lines of scar tissue, shouted soldier-king into the eyes of all who could see.

Azula crossed the amphitheater in silence. All eyes fell to her, hooked into her stride, glued to her every stalking step.

"Azula! Answer me!"

The Princess of Fire faced him, a dozen yards away. She stared daggers into his eyes as she peeled her cloak and shirt away, exposing her breast to the crowd and the elements without batting an eyelash.

* * *

Sokka stared so hard he nearly forgot to breathe.

"What's happening?" Toph asked, tugging Sokka's sleeve. It took four tugs to get his attention, to clear his mind enough to speak.

"Azula just took off her shirt," Sokka said, bewildered.

Toph's face scrunched into utter irritation.

"Yeah. That seals it," she half-sighed. "Azula's gone totally batshit crazy."

* * *

Azula stood silently, watching her father's reaction.

"Answer me!" Ozai demanded again. The torchbearers shrank back, flinging their burdens to the ground.

"I will not allow you to think of me as inferior to a man," Azula shot back, her voice as ringing clear as funeral bells. "I refuse to cover myself to cater to your standards! I will fight you like a man!"

A soft breeze blew. It picked up wisps of Azula's hair and carried them, lifting them as though they meant to get away but rather liked the head they had. With them, the flames from the fallen torches shot around the theater ring, surrounding father and daughter in a blistering orange haze.

Ozai's eyes narrowed. He took three deep breaths to calm himself-- for the Bending of Fire is a task requiring absolute control.

"Then you will die like a man," he spat, almost a spit whisper.

Azula stood stock still. Sokka could not tear his eyes from hers, from that wicked coldness she'd worn since murdering Avatar Aang. That empty, glass stare.

It was like looking into the eyes of a corpse.

Ozai stepped to the center of the ring.

Azula did not.

"I will not do you the honor of giving you ten paces, Father," she purred.

Ozai's teeth clenched.

"Then come at me with your best, daughter."

All in attendance jockeyed for position, looking for the best possible vantage point. Though it occurred to Sokka that they could all flee about now, dive for a safe place and free themselves from servitude, something held them there. History being made. Revolution in motion.

An end.

Sokka would have moved, if Toph had moved. But she didn't.

Fire Lord Ozai took his stance.

Azula stood stock still.

And heaven stood with her.

* * *

Ozai moved first. His hands whipped up and out, carrying with them a fat, crackling lariat twisting in blue flames.

Toph caught her breath. She could feel the intensity of Ozai's Firebending rippling along the ground, shaking her to the soft center of her spine. Her hold on Sokka's sleeve tightened, a wrenching deathgrip.

Ozai drew back and snapped his blazing whip across the ring, pouring sparks into the sky. The crowd of slaves erupted in a uniform "oooh!" when Azula rolled left, and broke out in a cheer when the whip snapped empty air.

Azula found her feet, and the next whiplash met her open hand and burst, dissipating into embers. Ozai's elbows jerked up and back, flares building at his finger tips.

Azula only stared with those ghoulish eyes, and when her father flung those scorching bolts at her, she barely batted a lash.

* * *

"She's not doing anything," Sokka whined, feeling his hopes for Ozai's destruction going up in smoke. "She's just standing there, dodging stuff!"

"Are you really that dense?" Toph snapped at him. "She's like a statue out there. Look at her!"

"I am," Sokka protested.

"Not at her chest."

"Oh."

Toph knew him too well.

"Idiot," Toph sighed, "Firebending requires a clear head. Azula's trying to frustrate him, I just know it. And she's scary-calm out there. She's not trembling like Ozai is."

Sokka turned his eyes back to the fight, wondering what Toph saw with her blind eyes that he could not with his functional ones.

* * *

Ozai threw every bolt of fire he knew at his daughter. He launched pillars of flame at her from the sides and above, he shot the ground beneath her into the sky, he tried to light her guts on fire from inside her own body-- but every step he made, every stance he took ended in failure. Azula leaped and dodged like a ferret, graceful and lithe and, Sokka had to admit, gorgeous in her terrifying swiftness. Not a single spark of fire came from her body.

"Why won't you fight me?" Ozai shouted, his taut muscles dripping sweat that evaporated before it touched the ground. "Do you expect to outlast me?"

Azula made no response.

Ozai screamed at her silence, and every torch and every lantern in Ba Sing Se shattered in a fountain of flame.

All hell took notice.

Fire Lord Ozai planted his feet at shoulder width. His hands cupped about his navel.

The hair on Sokka's arms stood up. An iron scent ripped across the sky as electrical energy gathered and crackled inside Ozai's body, swirling along with the circular sway of his massive arms. Yin and Yang and heaven and hell shoved to the sides.

They bowed to Fire Lord Ozai.

* * *

Toph sucked in a gasping breath.

"What's happening, Sokka?" she cried, clinging to his arm, most un-Toph-like. Sokka pulled his eyes away from the battle below at that tone in her voice. That vulnerability he had seen only once, when the last light in Avatar Aang's eyes had gone out forever.

"Ozai's building a lightning attack," he reported. "It's incredible, Toph."

"No. Not that." Toph stared in his direction. "Something's wrong. It feels like the air is vibrating against my skin, like earth and air are pulling together. What's Azula doing?"

"She's just standing still," Sokka said. He peered as hard as he could, trying to get a good look at her through the flames. "She's smiling."

* * *

Azula smiled her best and brightest for her father's last hurrah. She watched lightning channel through his belly and arms, and very nearly purred aloud at the sight. Ozai's control, even frustrated and spiteful, was phenomenal.

But Azula had a new trick to play on this day.

As the lightning gathered and strengthened, passing from one of Ozai's arms to the other, the Fire Princess lifted her left hand and let loose her breath.

* * *

Toph's head snapped up.

"Sokka, I know what's wrong," she shouted, startling those around her.

But Sokka could already see for himself.

* * *

Fire Lord Ozai drew his crackling power together. Finally, Azula had moved. He would feel better about smiting his daughter, now that she had put up a fight

It never occurred to him that her upraised hand carried no fire with it.

Not until the first stabbing pain in his chest registered in his mind.

Not until the first solid iron spike burst from inside his breastbone, and the lightning he'd gathered surged down the metal to flare into his heart.

Not until it was too late.

* * *

Sokka's jaw nearly dislocated, it dropped so hard.

"She's..." Toph began, spellbound at the earth resonating inside Ozai's body. "She's Metalbending, Sokka! The iron in his blood stream, she's expanding it!"

Sokka just nodded, agape.

* * *

A second spire or iron shot through Ozai's back. Another through his belly, four, up and through his shoulders.

Azula's breathing went ragged. A bead of blood flowed from her ripping scalp. The effort of Metalbending at this level stole her energy in massive chunks, but the damage had been done.

"Farewell, Father," she hissed through dry and cracking lips, her arms whirling, drawing her own electrical attack into her arms. "Say hello to Aang when you meet him in hell!"

* * *

The crowd saw what Sokka saw. Fire Lord Ozai, impaled from within his own body, smoldering from the scintillating storm of his own lightning attack. They saw Azula draw her arms back, crackling with electricity. They saw her thrust her arms forward and then--

Nothing. A flash, a silent flash of light that blinded Ba Sing Se for just a moment. Sokka rubbed his eyes, the world boiling in slow motion, swallowing its own eyes.

When the light faded, Toph and Sokka clung to one another, exhausted just from watching the war that had come and gone before them. Others in the crowd did the same, leaning forward and back and to the side; wherever they could find support, they took it.

"Sokka," Toph whispered, "is it over...?"

Sokka let his eyes rest on the twisted, bladed hunk of metal that lay on the ground where Fire Lord Ozai once stood, wrapped in a charred, dust gray skeleton.

"Azula. She won."

Toph closed her empty eyes, and eased her grip on Sokka's sleeve. A little.

"How the hell," she raged, "did Azula learn to Metalbend...?"

* * *

The flames at center ring dispersed as Azula collapsed to one knee. She sucked in great gulps of air, feeling nothing, knowing nothing except the sound of two impossible words.

"I've won," she whispered, over and over to herself. Even when her entourage dashed to the field with water and her cloak, she barely heard or saw them. She sipped greedily from the chilled flask a brown-haired girl offered to her, letting its coolness soothe her agonized lips and soften her throat.

The girl knelt next to her, dressed in the soft blue tunic of the water tribe.

"You did it. I knew you could do it," she whispered to Azula, patting the Fire Princess on the back. "You killed him. You destroyed Ozai. He's gone."

Azula smiled just a little bit, and looked into the eyes of the water girl.

And kissed her, briefly, gently.

* * *

Sokka thrust Toph away from his arm. He blinked, rubbed his eyes again.

"Hey! Why did you shove me, Snoozles?" Toph demanded to know, rubbing her arm and swatting at Sokka's back.

"Toph," he cried, eyes brimming with excitement, confusion, and shockawe. "That water girl kneeling next to Azula. I know her!"

"So what?"

Sokka rubbed his eyes again. He could barely believe he was about to say.

"That's my sister...!"


	3. Chapter 3: Stairway to Heaven

Note from the author: Sorry about the long wait, everyone. Graduation, my sister's suicidal depression, my dad's double bypass heart surgery, and trying to start a career really got in the way this month. This chapter starts out a bit rough for it, so I apologize up front. There'll be one more chapter after this, I think, and I'll show you all something epic to make up for it.

* * *

Chapter 3: Stairway to Heaven

"Heaven me such uses send,

Not to pick bad from bad, but by bad mend. "

--Desdemona, _Othello,_ Act IV, scene iii

"Snoozles. Sokka. Idiot. Huh. Well, those are usually the words that wake him up."

"Give him a break. After tonight he won't have much time to sleep."

"You really think he'll agree to go through with this? He's been half a man since Azula took his sword away."

"This has been a long time coming, Toph. Ty Lee is dead. Ozai is dead. Mai is Azula's slave and sometimes her concubine, and Katara... well, Katara I don't know about."

Sokka edged his lashes apart. Slogging between waking and dreaming, he could barely recognize the voices flowing just over his cot. Toph's sharp, bassy tone snapped at his eardrums like knuckles cracking bone, but the other voice escaped his recollection. It rattled with gravel like a man's, but soothed over that with femininity—rather like a girl's with a whiskey fixation.

"Snoozles! I hate you sometimes. Wake--"

A sudden pain in Sokka's side rang like alarm bells in his head.

"--up!"

Sokka snapped bolt upright, blinking against the light, and glared at Toph.

"Hey! Do you have to kick me every morning, Toph? I--"

His words careened into one another. No wonder he hadn't recognized the other woman—Sokka had not seen her since his first direct assault on the Fire Nation. He stared agape for a second, then aghast for two more.

"Suki."

It took a while for Sokka to slow the spinning in his brain. Suki, the lady soldier who had fought her way to the throne of Ozai six years ago. Suki, who had challenged the Fire Lord and lost. Suki, the woman who had challenged Sokka to be a man, and then ripped out his heart like a woman. Suki... the woman he'd loved so long ago.

"I don't really know where to begin," she told them over breakfast. "After Ozai beat me, he set me on a funeral barge with my soldiers and set us adrift on the ocean. One by one their injuries got the best of them, those who weren't already dead.

"A week later, the raft struck land north of here. I took what supplies were left and started walking. I had no idea where I was. I just went," Suki said, picking idly at her food. "Everywhere I went, the land was scorched. I hid from war machines and scouting parties. I picked my way all the way to Ba Sing Se. By the time I arrived I was dehydrated, hungry, and exhausted, and... I just didn't have the strength left to fight. and walked right into one of Azula's scouting parties."

"But why did you wait so long to come to us?" Sokka almost demanded, six years' worth of longing boiling black with resentment. Suki met his cold stare with an equally chilling gaze.

"You weren't a priority," she almost hissed.

Sokka felt the muscles in his face turn to globs of butter, his anger melting into horror. His heart sank. His balls shriveled.

"Not a priority?" Toph snapped before Sokka could collect himself. "So what was, then?"

Suki shrugged her still-smooth shoulders. "Aang. But I didn't know for sure that he'd died until I saw Azula metalbending yesterday. I've been to every temple still standing, consulted every guru-wannabe I could find, and every last one of them said the same thing. 'The knowledge of the avatar is still alive.'" The soldier hung her head a bit. "I thought they meant Aang was alive. But, no."

"I don't get it," Sokka whined. He sort of did. Something about hearing the news from Suki only made him want to misunderstand.

Toph, sensing the tension in his voice, decided to bring Sokka to his senses the best way she knew how: with an elbow to the ribs. "She said," explained the Earthbender before Sokka's pain could even register, "the knowledge was alive. It means Azula inherited Aang's power somehow."

"Aang couldn't Metalbend," Sokka complained, rubbing at his side. "That doesn't make sense."

Toph had to admit the moron had a point. She parted her lips to ask for clarification, but sealed them in a heartbeat at the clanking steps of approaching Fire Nation soldiers. Every head in the mess hall bowed low, eyes down.

Sokka stared at the table, grumbling to himself. If he only had his sword, he would take these soldiers out and finish off Azula himself.

"Commander Suki," called one of the soldiers.

Sokka felt his blood run cold. If he could have bitten through his teeth just then, he would have.

"I'm supervising, leave me the hell alone," Suki snapped at the unassuming Fire nation soldier.

"Queen Azula requests your presence," the soldier stammered anyway, to Suki's apparent irritation. She waved her hand idly, dismissing the soldiers without a word of respect. When the messengers failed to depart, Suki snapped up her not yet empty plate and flung it, discus-like, to shatter against the speaker's armor.

"Leave!" Her shouting voice burst over mild snickering from around the mess. And they did, at last, faces as red as their armor. Suki grumbled under her breath, something about mindless peon drones, before turning back to Sokka.

"I'm putting you two in charge of Azula's latest order," she said in her official voice, unrolling a bit of parchment for him to read. "Destroy every last trace of Fire Lord Ozai sycophancy polluting my city," she read. "You're to start with his statue in the catacombs, just across from the arsenal. Don't get any ideas, either." Suki stood then, before Sokka's annoyed eyes. "Someone said there's an old messenger road behind that particular statue. It's supposed to run all the way to the throne chambers. If you find it, handle it." Her eyes sparkled with some long-buried mischief, then. "I trust you'll know what to do."

Sokka blinked. "Where do you get off giving us orders like GYAA!" He clutched his side in sudden elbow-induced-agony. Toph slapped his shoulder, twice. "Why are you hitting me!?"

"We'll do it," the Earthbender answered for him. "Thanks."

Suki turned then to leave. "Don't mention it." She paused. "Ever."

* * *

Later that night, less than two days removed from Azula's coronation, Toph and an exhausted Sokka stood before an enormous, solid-gold statue of Ozai, checklist in hands. It was a regal sculpture to be certain, displaying the deposed Fire Lord on his throne, chin leaned thoughtfully on fist, eyes half-closed in their wiles. The sepulchral air of the catacombs weighed heavily on both of them; they smelled of graves from head to throat to toes.

Sokka hauled himself onto the waist-high pedestal supporting the statue. "This is the one, according to Suki's note," he said. "I think this is pure gold. Are you sure you can handle it?"

"As sure as I am that you still have a sweet spot for Suki," Toph shrugged, running still-spindly fingers along the smooth convex surfaces of the statue, making a mental note of every chip and ding in the gold. "You tell me."

"That's not true—"

"I mean, it's not like I needed a fortune teller to explain that," Toph grumbled, "I don't see why you two are gonna waste time with this fake dislike act."

"Toph, knock it off already—"

"I mean, it's not like she's joined Azula's army or anything."

Sokka leapt down from the pedestal. The slap of Suki's note smacking against the solid stone palace floor rang throughout the halls as Sokka heaved it away.

"You don't know anything!" he spewed, coming face to face with her. How could she be so cold about this? How could she not see where his feelings really pointed? "I can't just hate her for being on Azula's side, the same way I can't hate Katara! And besides, there's..." Sokka paused. Pulled his breath deeply into his lungs, composing himself. "There's someone else I care for these days. I don't need a memory like Suki. Okay?" The Water tribesman paused again. He watched her face, so expressive even without functioning eyes. Wished that face could be filled with understanding and compassion right now.

Sokka breathed in, and demanded, "What's it to you, anyway?"

Toph felt her chest beginning to heave, lungs dragging air inside by the gulpful. She felt that long buried sting wringing at her tear ducts, and whirled to turn her back on Sokka. Of course he wouldn't know that. Idiot.

"Nothing. Just get away from the stupid statue, Snoozles."

Toph drew her hand down, flattening her palm, and turned slowly to face the golden statue of Ozai. She lifted her arm, feeling the air, feeling it whistle against the stones around the statue. "There's air coming from behind it," she reported. "Stand back."

Her hand and arm shot toward Ozai's golden knee in a straight line, fingers pointed praying-mantis style. Sokka stumbled away before the ground had a chance to really quiver, ripping open beneath the sparkling image of the deceased fire lord to swallow it completely in the forming chasm. Dust and cobwebs fell from the ceiling, bones rattled to the floor from their bunk-like graves.

Sokka never failed to be impressed by her, and her incredible power over the land. He was so impressed that, for a moment, he didn't see the glittering object plunged into a cavern wall formerly concealed by the statue. He just... stared at the flattened head of Ozai, and grinned.

"This passage must go on forever," Toph mused, stepping into the cool, fresher air behind the statue's resting place. "It feels deep. Like... miles deep. I bet it really does run to the palace. C'mon, idiot. We're gonna get Azula and she'll never know it's coming."

Sokka nodded, smiling, truly and genuinely. He looked up to say something to her, but instantly forgot what it was going to be.

"Toph...!" He took a single bounding step, then two, and very nearly crashed into the passage wall. His hand molded around the thing sticking from the wall, fingers feeling a familiar metallic texture, hand wrapping around the handle of the thing as if it had been born to do so.

Sokka tugged. Hard. Harder, and nearly fell backwards when the black sword ripped free. He let out a whoop, a cry of utter joy, and waved it around in the air, cherishing its weight, the weight of his very own creation.

Toph skittered back to the wall. "What the hell?" she demanded in her inimitable way.

"My sword," Sokka nearly sputtered, "Suki must have put it here. Someone put it here."

Toph stopped to consider. "How would Suki get it back there? She wouldn't have access to the throne room, would she? At least not without Azula around, too."

"Well someone put it here," Sokka declared proudly. "I don't care who."

Toph thought about that for a moment. She leaned against the wall, but only briefly, mind racing. "We need to hurry," she spat, "or someone's gonna catch us. Start walking, oh master swordsman."

Sokka didn't mind the disdain in her voice. He smiled brightly and began to walk, almost skipping, so pleased with himself that he barely noticed Toph caving the entrance to the passage in, sealing out the last of the catacombs' torchlight.

In the abrupt darkness, Sokka nearly stumbled but, when he did, his hand was enveloped by Toph's. She held onto it, helping him stay balanced.

"You really are a moron," she whispered, but softly, pleasantly. "Don't let go of my hand. I don't need the light to guide me."

Sokka smiled a little, glad for the caliginous mire encasing them in black. No one could see his smile, or his relieved blush. Together they walked, hand in hand, each suddenly inescapably aware of the other. They walked in silence, but when Sokka squeezed Toph's hand now and again, they communicated much more closely than they could have with words.

By the time they came to a massive, gently rising stairway, Sokka had let his eyes close, aware of little more than her warmth against his palm. Her. Toph. His war buddy, his confidante, his partner in everything since Aang's death, and now his only hope of reaching Azula and his sister... and learning the truth.

For two seemingly endless miles they walked, and he thought. Thought, and thought, dwelling, considering things he needed to say and how little time remained to say them. Death loomed before them, they both knew that, and its jaws hung wide and shut swiftly. He knew its jaws could swallow them, and soon.

"Toph," he whispered as their sandaled feet tapped upon the first step, breathing faster as he thought about what came next. "Stop, Toph."

She did. Her hand stayed where it was.

"Something wrong?" she asked, though her voice fluttered. She knew. She could feel his heartbeat, warm and rapid against her palm.

"We're going to fight Azula, probably," Sokka whispered. "Alone. We... you know, this might be, uh, the last chance we have to talk, and..."

Toph squeezed his hand a little harder, breath rising in her lungs. "Yeah?" She couldn't say "go on." Just couldn't.

But he did.

"Toph, I'm sorry I yelled at you. I just, I... after everything, all this, you know..."

Toph gripped his hand harder, heart picking up his racing pulse.

"Just tell me, you dopey bastard," she begged, and nearly choked on her spiking sense of vulnerability. "Tell me whatever you need to tell me, I..."

In the dark, his lips nearly missed hers. But they didn't. His sword, so joyously recovered moments before, clattered to the marble staircase and his arms flung around her, and hers around him, and their lips danced and clung to one another so desperately they nearly hurt, as if both of them knew this was coming, and both knew the parts they needed to play instinctively. Their hands rushed and roamed, lips dined on one another, breath mingled in warm delicacy.

He didn't need to say it. He didn't need to, but he did.

"I love you, Toph. You. It's... always been you..." he whispered, eyes flooding with tears of joy and relief. "I'm so sorry I didn't tell you, I..."

The Earthbender cut his voice to silence with her lips, arms flowing around his neck, pulling him down to her level. She kissed him breathless and, gasping, clung to his broad chest in the blackness.

"It's alright, you idiot, it's alright. Now is a good time. Now is a great time, now, is a wonderful, Sokka..."

In the dark, on what they both knew could well be their last hour on the mortal coil, Sokka and Toph sank to the rising stairs and let loose the love they'd built over six long, agonizing years. Unrestrained, without fear of consequences or worry for tomorrow, they lie together for a long, long time.

Azula's throne nested at the peak of those stairs. But for this moment, this hour, they built their heaven halfway to the top... and they knew that it was good.


	4. Chapter 4: Zero Hour

Chapter 4: Zero Hour

"With what compulsion and laborious flight

We sunk thus low? Th' ascent is easie then;

Th' event is fear'd; should we again provoke

Our stronger, some worse way his wrath may find

To our destruction: if there be in Hell

Fear to be worse destroy'd: what can be worse

Then to dwell here, driv'n out from bliss, condemn'd

In this abhorred deep to utter woe(?)"

--Moloch, _Paradise Lost_: Book Two, John Milton

* * *

Something about encroaching darkness made their moment easier. Toph let down her guard, let down her granite exterior with only the slightest resistance; but only while the shadow drank Sokka's sight could she be so free of heart and body. Deep inside her heart she feared what tomorrow might bring; dead at Azula's hands, or alive in Sokka's arms and wondering if the gave in to the moment. Either way, knowing he could not see her simplified things.

Still... his breath against her neck as they held one another in the shadow felt undeniably right. After a short while, though, Toph inevitably wrested herself gently free of his embrace.

"We need to go," she all but whispered, feeling the reluctance in his fingertips.

Sokka let himself stand, groping lightly for his sword in the dark. Catching his breath.

"How much farther do you think this tunnel runs?" he inquired of his long beloved Toph, his sentence punctuated with a hard breath.

"Dunno. Start marching already." She smiled, knowing he couldn't see.

But Sokka knew she would, and smiled, too.

And they walked together in the shadow of Death, both prepared to meet him--head-on to find out what lay beyond.

* * *

"The end is right there," Toph announced, softly though. Her senses danced at the edge of high alert, reading the pits and scratches along every surface of the cavern wall, and she could instantly tell that the end of the tunnel lay blocked. She ran her hands over its surface, considering the texture, and gave it a soft thump of her knuckle. A knocking sound echoed down the cavern, light and airy like paper.

"This is fresh," she explained to a curious Sokka. "This has been walled up in the last few days, and it's hollow."

"Maybe Azula found it," the swordsman suggested, squinting in the meager light flowing through slits in the wall. "Well... I can't see her ordering us to fool around by the other end of this tunnel, even if Suki had a hand in the orders."

"Someone knew it was here. Someone put your sword down there. Someone wanted us to be here, Sokka. Who better to open up a fresh wall than an Earthbender? It feels too easy to me." Toph slid her hand along the wall. "Look through these slits if you can, moron. Quit doing nothing."

Sokka obediently pressed his face to the wall, trying to get a look into the throne room through the slits. He glimpsed a hint of a red dress on a shapely, graceful young woman--Azula. As he watched, the Fire Queen stepped fully into his view and sat upon her throne, crossing her legs and leaning back, relaxed, without a care in the world. She sipped from a silver chalice, drawing the lustrous metal along her glistening lips. Flicked her tongue along the rim, gazing ever forward.

"She must really like that drink," Sokka mused, but ceased his line of thought just about the time a second woman entered his view, clad entirely in blue. He very nearly facefaulted as Katara swished her way to the throne and straddled the queen's lap, gazing into her eyes.

"What's going on?" Toph demanded, feeling the vibration from Sokka's furious trembling. She stretched out her senses, listening with her ears and sense of touch. One person in the next room. Two? She could not be sure.

"Open the wall, Toph," the swordsman nearly spat. "Azula's right there with Katara. Open it!"

"Don't be an idiot, you idiot! You can't go charging in there against Azula. You need a plan." The Earthbender pressed herself against the hollow wall, listening. "I can probably stop her from Metalbending like she did with Ozai. But I need you to protect me. There's no telling what Katara will do, either."

"She'll fight with us," Sokka declared with the supreme confidence of a boy who has never been in a fight.

"You can't be sure about that. You saw them kissing," Toph points out. "Remember? And we saw what happened to Mai. Azula's clearly into girls."

"Yeah, well, so am I, so she's got no advantage there," Sokka hissed in utter seriousness. "Ugh. They're kissing again."

A moment passed. Toph tapped on the wall again.

"Actually... how into it are they?" she inquired, to Sokka's endless disgust.

A sudden squeak, breathy and feminine, answered the question for her.

"Fine. It might be just enough distraction for us to get her before she's ready to fight back." Toph laid her hand upon the wall again, studying its weaknesses and strengths. "It's not much of a wall. You could probably kick through without trying very hard."

Sokka turned his eyes away from the throne room, knuckles straining somewhat against the handle of his sword. "I can't do it that way," he said. "I can't kill Azula like a mugger on the street."

"Of course you can," Toph snapped a little louder than she meant. "We should've done it this way to begin with. All that bluster, challenging Fire nation officers, just got people killed."

"What would Aang say if that's how we avenged his murder?" Sokka glared at her, ineffectually of course. It occurred to him, somewhere in the back of his love- and fury-addled mind, that if they could hear a pleasured squeak from the throne room, it was possible their own voices could carry through as well.

"He's not saying anything," hissed Toph as Sokka held a finger to his lips--before he could think better of it. Toph continued. "Because he challenged her and she fried him for it. And he had the Avatar State on his side, Sokka."

"Well, together, we..."

"Are two overworked, minimally fed, and exhausted runaway slaves," the Earthbender cut in before Sokka could continue. "We have to use every advantage we can get, and right now, that means the advantage of surpr--"

Surprise, she almost said, before the flimsy wall burst inward, raining dust and rock upon their unsuspecting heads. Sokka's heart lurched, he shouted in shock but instantly found his mouth coated in plaster bits. He coughed, spat the chalky filth out and coughed again, awash in sudden heat. He breathed half a breath and hacked it back out. He couldn't see; as the lights of the throne room stole into the tunnel his eyes were dazzled, full of painful blinking stars.

"I didn't know we had rats in the walls," sang a still-blushing Azula. Sokka could just see her figure as the dust parted, her svelte curves and regal posture looming above where he and Toph crouched in the powder of the wall. "Or holes in them. Come into my chambers, slaves, and kneel before my throne. We," she held up a hand, blazing with contained flames, "have to talk."

Sokka stared into her eyes, and could swear he was staring into the frozen gorges of his homeland again. And he saw there the very same thing he had seen in the ice and murderous cold of home; death, death, endless plains of death. He stared into the mouth of Hell, and it smiled with soft, pouting lips.

Sokka took the first tentative step from the tunnel, chancing a look back at the remnants of the wall where Azula's fireball burst through. The bricks of her throne room glittered gold, as did the remnants of the trick wall; they were a perfect match.

Toph did not rise from her crouch at first, moving only when Azula's burning fist threatened to strike across her cheek. When she did, it was with some difficulty, and she walked to to the throne with a pronounced limp that trailed spots of blood on the floor. Sokka guessed a piece of the splintered wall held blame, but dared not speak or slow to find out.

Azula held her breath for just a moment.

"Give me your sword, slave," she commanded, a tyrant now in tone as well. Sokka stood straight in the draft of the throne room, clutching the handle of his prized blade against his chest.

He did not hand the weapon over.

"If I have to ask a second time, I'll just have to take it from your corpse. Stop and think about where you are. You'll gain nothing from being stubborn." The Fire Queen descended upon him, staring at him eye-to-eye, fearless of his skill with the sword. Wisps of her black hair tickled his forehead, and he could smell her breath against his lips and nose; it smelled just lightly of sulfur mixed into a mountain stream, of two pure elements sitting side by side. Fire and Water.

He glanced involuntarily to Katara, whose eyes lay round and glittering with fear and concern--though for which party, Sokka could not tell.

Azula caught the change in his expression, and stepped away. Her throne sat against the rear wall of an enormous, elaborate royal chamber in a typical style, complete with ornate pillars on both sides of a carpeted runway. The royal seat itself sat at the top of a seven-step staircase, and was perhaps the most softly cushioned chair in all existence; a chair upon which Katara, Sokka's long-lost sister, sat naked from the waist up, arms crossed over her somewhat unimpressive breasts.

"I knew you looked familiar," the Fire Queen fairly gloated as she ascended the stairs. "You're Katara's brother, Sokka. And you," her eyes narrowed to fearsome slits, "are the Earthbender, Toph."

"Congratulations," Toph chuckled, the dry, humorless chuckle of sarcasm. "You know the names of the people who are gonna kill you today."

Azula simply smiled at that, unmoved. Sokka glanced to his beloved, admiring her brass but confounded at the same time. Why the sudden surge of bravado after all that talk of a surprise attack?

"I'm sorry if I didn't instantly recognize you. But we've all matured since the last time I crushed your little assembly of storybook heroes and Toph, I never thought I'd see you with curves." The Fire Queen chuckled. "I assumed you would have turned into a boy by now."

Toph's cheeks flushed red-hot.

"What in all creation made you two insects think you could challenge me?" Azula continued, extending her arm a bit as she reached the throne to stroke Katara's blushing cheek; Sokka had never felt the urge to sever hand so completely in all his life.

"There's nothing you could do to us that would be worse than being your slaves," he instantly barked, feeding off Toph's humiliation and the subjugation of his sister.

"Don't," Azula snapped with a dramatic flair of her blood-red cloak, "wager on that, Sokka. There are innumerable things I could do to you worse than three meals a day and employment for life."

"You murdered Aang!" the swordsman all but shouted, frustration tensing the muscles in his back and shoulders. Azula, again, only smiled.

"Yes, I did." She smiled a little brighter, standing with her long, flowing neck craned prettily over her shoulders, those vibrant lips sweetly upturned. "So?"

Sokka felt the color drain from his face.

"So? So? He was my friend! He was the only one who could restore balance to the world, Azula, he--"

"As if those things somehow negate the fact that he intended to kill my father and I?" she demanded. "I burned him into dust to protect myself, my family, and my kingdom. You would consent to being a hypocrite if you faulted me for that."

"Aang never would have come after you if the Fire Nation hadn't tried to conquer the world!" Toph's fingers flexed, and Sokka knew she was on the brink of trying something foolish. He looked into Azula's eyes, and he knew that she knew it, too.

"Toph, no," he whispered. "Don't."

Azula just smiled. "Go ahead, Toph. I won't kill you until I can call it self-defense, for Sokka's sake."

"Stop, Toph!"

All functional eyes in the throne room swung to Katara, to behold her features grim and terrified. Sokka bit his lip; if only he could find out which side his sister belonged to!

"Don't waste your lives," the Waterbender begged of the slaves. "There's been enough blood. Let Ozai be the last casualty of our war."

The swordsman's blood ran cold.

"Katara, you... how long have you been a traitor?" Sokka's voice lifted and boomed in the lofty chamber, accusing and powerful in an instant.

Katara lowered her eyes. Held her tongue.

"I am done with this," Azula cut in. "You've already admitted your plans to kill me. When the sun reaches its zenith tomorrow, I will execute... one of you." Her smile turned up at the corners, beautiful and terrifying like a rush of flame sweeping through and consuming the summer forests. "I'll decide which one tomorrow. Around noon."

"No. No!" Sokka lifted his sword, a gesture entirely for show at distance. His hands trembled on the handle, his muscles tensed, calves hard, ready to spring up the stairs and... he had no idea what he would do.

Azula's quizzical expression said the same thing.

"You're not foolish enough to rush me, Sokka. What do you think you're going to do with that barbarous toy in your hands?" The Fire Queen's voice rang cool and even, as if she and Sokka were discussing bread recipes. Toph marveled at Azula's composure; but as she listened, bit by bit, she thought she could hear a sense of wondrous despair in those cold notes.

_ She sounds like she _wants_ to be beaten, in a way,_ Toph said to herself. If nothing else--Sokka _definitely_ had her attention. And so, the Earthbender's fingers began to move again.

"Don't fight me, " Azula continued, her tone as edged as ever. "You'll only lose your life, Sokka. You don't want that."

Toph held her breath. Her senses crept along the ceiling, searching for the perfect block to bring down upon Azula's head. She needed only a few more seconds to Earthbend the sealed seams of the block loose enough...

"You have no idea what I want," Sokka spat.

"How very presumptuous of you. Fine." Azula held her arms out, feet setting her preferred stance. "I will kill you, if that is what you want. But I won't do it happily."

Azula never saw the dust falling from above. Toph struggled to keep from panting, from giving away her clandestine 'bending in what pillowed into a choking silence.

Sokka gritted his teeth. _Now, _he thought, _or never._

As the swordsman's muscles sprung from coil, launching him into a run, the sound of brick scraping brick stabbed the sullen silence to death. Toph abandoned subtlety and flicked out her arms, commanding the ceiling to release its hold on the half-ton of brick she'd drilled free.

Azula's arms swung like clock hands in gorgeous rhythm, and with them spurted wheels of crackling flames that pealed down the stairs en route to the charging Sokka. He kicked the runway rug hard, propelling himself to the side in time to feel the flesh of his feet blister and scorch. He struck ground harder than he'd intended, knocking wind from his lungs, but picked up his feet and dashed to the stairs.

In that instant Katara blinked as a thimbleful of dust peppered her nose. She turned her eyes skyward, to the ceiling so high above.

The block gave one last moaning scrape before, at last, it cracked free of its restraints. Sunlight crowded into the throne room behind it, its shadow fattening in a heartbeat around Azula's blazing body.

"Azula, move!" Katara shouted, springing from the throne, her thoughts and steps a blur.

Azula turned her eyes to Katara just in time to be bowled over, shoved so hard she lost her footing and tumbled to the floor. Sokka's sword flashed above her head and came down almost in the same instant, but the Fire Queen plunged her hands in front of it with a piercing shout-- the glittering black blade warped before it ever touched her.

"Katara!" Toph tried to shout but lost her voice in the blasting crash of stone shattering floor and water woman. Katara's shrieks stole the attention of both Sokka and Azula; the black blade straightened, but Sokka lacked the wherewithal to bring it down, to ram it into the Fire Queen's ashen heart and cleave her organs from her bones.

Thus it was Azula who acted first. Her hips bucked to one side and she rolled, tumbling down the stairs, her arms and neck tucked to foil injury as she rolled to her feet at the bottom. Her eyes shot from Toph to the block to Katara, lying pinned under the slab, caught from mid-thigh to her feet, crying, screaming in pain. The Fire Queen hesitated; she had no idea what to do, but fortunately for her, neither did Sokka or Toph. The three stood in a strange, awkward stalemate, each afraid to make a choice, each afraid to act one way or another. Help Katara, risking attack, or defend, and let Katara bleed to death?

At last, the flames burning up and down Azula's arms relented.

"Help me!" she cried then to Sokka and Toph, all but charging up the stairs to lay her hands on the enormous block. She tried to lift, beyond rationale, but quiet, so quiet even she could not explain her feelings at that moment.

Sokka growled despite himself. He knew he could take her life as she stood, but Katara's wailing had his attention. "Move!" he shouted to the Fire Queen, hefting his black sword. "Toph! I'm going to split this thing down the middle, can you move it?"

"I'll try," the Earthbender panted, nearly exhausted from her painstaking labor of earlier. Azula stared at her, eyes the monstrous icebergs that imprisoned Aang all those years ago.

Sokka closed his eyes, tried to put Katara's screams out of his mind. He held the blade level, just above her; he would cut the slab laterally, and if Toph could Earthbend the large piece out of the way, moving the other would be much easier. He gathered every scrap of his concentration and whirled with the blade, crouching in mid-swing to part the stone at the lowest possible point. "Now, Toph!" he shouted, the blade having slid cleanly through the stone.

Toph held up her arms, and punched one forward, trying to shove the heavy slab aside; but it barely moved at all. She tried again, panting already, to the same effect.

"Get out of the way," Azula suddenly raged at them, taking her stance again. She closed her eyes, as had Sokka, and turned her arms in fluid circles, crackling with sudden lightning. Her regal figure lifted, and then shot from the ground, propelled by flame and split lightning into the air. Sokka watched in absolute awe; Azula was _flying. _Flying!

"Get ready to grab her," she shouted, arms still spinning their burning circles. Toph cringed at the vibrations strangling the earth.

Sokka threw his sword to the ground and nodded. His heart could have leaped through his lips; he could have slapped the face of a god right then, for all his terror, all his adrenaline had numbed him to the bone, saturated him to the bursting. He had nothing left to fear.

The air stank of brimstone as Azula's lightning coursed through her body, charging her with light and heat to power the technique she brought to bear. The slabs began to rise, almost inexplicably; Sokka stared in wonder at this, at the absolute power that had destroyed Fire Lord Ozai.

When the slabs rose sufficiently, propelled into the air by a dozen poles of pure iron from the floor, Sokka grabbed his sister's arms and jerked her free, dragging her, leaving a trail of blood from the throne. He fought his horror at the sight; her legs lay crushed behind her, and her weeping told of a pain unimaginable to him.

Azula wavered in the air, and descended, crumpling in a heap not far from Toph. Her forehead ran with blood, and she sucked air into her lungs so weakly she barely seemed to breathe.

The poles melted away, and the slab smashed to the floor again.

For a long time, all four of them simply lay where they were, breathing, exhausted. Azula moved first, wobbling to stand, stumbling up the stairs, flames still flickering at her fingertips in spurts. Sokka reached for his sword again, but when his hand wrapped around the handle he felt, rather than heard, Katara's voice against him, sobbing still.

"Sokka, no," she whispered over her agonized tears, as Azula crumpled to her knees next to Katara's ruined legs. The Fire Queen stared at them, mouth moving, chest heaving still, so intent on the damage done that she barely noticed her guards breaking down the throne doors, the head of a battering ram just beginning to plow through its great surface.

"Waterbenders," the Fire Queen whispered, as the doors caved in, "call for healers, Sokka, call for healers! Tell them!"

But he couldn't move. He sat, transfixed, as the fire Queen's tears splashed onto Katara's prone body, wetting her hands; hands blooming in azure aura over the blood and flesh. He could almost sense Katara's chi funneling under Azula's power, routing to the damage, beginning to repair the powdered bones and broken muscles.

"Call for help," Azula pleaded, blood flowing freely from her forehead now, "please..."

But it was Toph who started shouting first. Toph who raced to the broken door and bowed her proud head in front of the Fire Nation guards as the gate splintered and fell inward.

Azula's hands wavered over Katara's wounds. Her breath came in gasps. Sokka watched as the damage to his sister knitted, slowly, impossibly slowly... and slowing further with every second, with every drop of blood beading from Azula's skin; the Fire Queen was obviously not designed to Waterbend like this.

"She's the only one," Katara whispered, eyes glazed, body numb, "Azula, she... she can still balance... Aang's knowledge is alive in her, Sokka..."

Sokka just shook his head, eyes wide, unable to process all of this.

"But she killed Aang," he whispered back, holding his sister's hands for dear life. "She... just hold on, Katara, just save your breath."

"No, listen, she..." Katara caught her breath as her bones began to snap back together, fusing weakly, breaking again. "She... the Avatar State, I was there. I saw it, she... she saw everything, she... no one's ever killed an Avatar State before, no one knew... she, she, she saw everything...!"

Sokka squeezed her hands, tighter, feeling them start to warm again.

"Everything... what do you mean?"

Katara stared at him balefully, as if she needed him to understand the first time.

"The knowledge of every, every Avatar, Sokka, she saw it, she..." Her lids drooped. Sokka caught his breath. He couldn't hear the clanging steps of the Fire Nation soldiers approaching. Couldn't feel Suki's hands on his shoulders, dragging him away. Couldn't see the Waterbenders descending on his sister, slaves the lot of them, hands blazing blue as other slaves carted buckets of water up the stairs, led by Toph.

"Katara, no, please don't talk anymore, please just open your eyes!" He shouted over the din, and her eyes opened a bit more -- and drooped again. Sokka looked up, desperately, at Azula, but the Fire Queen lay slumped on her side, hands still flickering blue as Fire Nation soldiers swarmed her, keeping the slaves away; just in case.

Sokka lost sight of Toph. He felt a sharp pain, a fist crammed against his diaphragm, and then motion, jumbled, awkward. He didn't see his attacker, but in the next moment he found himself being tossed into the clutches of armored soldiers, dragged screaming down the stairs. He couldn't see Katara anymore.

He couldn't see anything anymore, blinded by tears and blood and a second fist, mailed and heavy, careening towards his eyes.

* * *

When Sokka came to, it was to the rank and murk of Ba Sing Se's dungeons. He knew their foul, skin-sliming air well, having spent two months there after the war ended. He wondered where the blood-black sky was, where were the windows that awakened him every morning.

"Snoozles," he heard just in the corner of his mind, and sat bolt upright; he could almost feel the kick coming before it came.

But it didn't. Instead, he felt a pair of warm lips brush his, and nearly fell backwards again--but Toph's arm steadied him, and held him in place.

"Looking for something else?" she laughed as she released him, letting him fall to his mat. He beheld the black ceiling of their cell, the dozens of bars surrounding them, but most of all beheld Toph's smile, and clung to it. "I can't kick you this morning, moron. Look." She held up her foot, showing off a set of clean, fresh bandages.

Sokka blinked, then, and sat up again.

"Don't you dare start doting on me just because we kissed, Sokka. I'll still kick your ass," Toph chuckled, leaning back against a pile of old pillows stacked in the corner of their cell.

"What happened to Katara?" the swordsman asked, but softly, still absorbing the situation.

"Ask her yourself," the Earthbender shrugged. "She's across the hall."

Sokka blinked, and dragged himself to stand. He didn't know he had a vast bruise blanketing his forehead and eyes from the Fire Soldier's fist. Didn't care. "Katara?" he called.

Silence.

"Katara?"

"Mm..." a groggy Waterbender murmured from her sleeping mat. "Sokka?" She sat up a little, smiling softly at him. "Glad to see you're awake. I''d stand, but..."

And then Sokka's eyes fell over Katara's legs, set with splints and bandaged heavily.

"I'm okay," she told him before he could ask. "The slaves healed me, they took over when Azula passed out. But there's only so much Waterbending can do. Time will handle the rest."

"Katara, what were you trying to tell me before we got separated?" Sokka clung to the bars, peering in dim light to try to see her face more clearly. He stood straight, almost too eager to hear this; he never thought he would get another chance to hear it.

Katara lay silent for a moment. Sokka wanted to press, but restrained himself; they had time. In these dungeons, they had time.

"No one's ever killed an Avatar State before Azula. How could they? We've always had an Avatar in the cycle, so no one knew for sure what would happen." Katara sighed softly. "It was all legend, rumor. When Azula took Aang's life, I saw her eyes open so wide, I thought they were going to burst. I was right there, Sokka. When Aang died, I wanted to tear Azula apart, but..."

She paused. Sokka waited, fingers tense on the bars.

"At first I thought Aang had gone into her body somehow. She started talking, saying crazy things, and at first it was in Aang's voice. But then... the voice changed. It deepened. She talked to herself. She called herself Roku, then Kyoshi, then Kuruk..."

Sokka caught his breath. So _that's_ what Suki's guru contacts had meant by '"the knowledge of the avatar is still alive" from the start.

"Azula's the new Avatar?" he breathlessly demanded.

"No," Katara shook her head. "No. She just... she saw them all. They taught her everything, as their spirits passed from Aang's body. She has their knowledge but... when she dies, it dies with her."

Barely a breath sounded in the dungeon, for a long, long moment. Katara shuffled a little, trying to find a comfortable place.

"I know you're mad at me. But... the second Azula came to, I saw something different in her. I saw the pain of thousands of years in her eyes, Sokka. I thought... maybe she could still bring balance to the world again, if she could just be convinced. So... I became her prisoner. I became her lover. And after all of that... she loved me, back. It took a while. It had to. But... it's been good, with her. Ozai was supposed to be the last one to die."

Sokka sat down again, letting all of this sink in. "How could you fall in love with Azula, though? After she killed Aang?"

"She didn't know any better," Katara swiftly answered, nearly a reprimand. "She was raised that way. She didn't have anything else to believe. Everything I believed in was gone, and... honestly, we only had each other."

Sokka nodded, ineffectually. "Okay. That... I can go with that." Silence slathered awkwardness into the air again. Sokka fidgeted.

"So... what happens to us?" he asked, at last.

No one knew. The silence told them all the truth in that.


	5. Epilogue: The Seventh Year

Epilogue: The Seventh Year

"Do not go gentle into that good night,  
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;  
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,  
Because their words had forked no lightning they  
Do not go gentle into that good night."

--Dylan Thomas, _Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night_

* * *

Sokka's plowhead bit into the earth, cleaving easily again, and again, and again. He mopped his brow, and turned his eyes from the rising sun over Ba Sing Se. He never knew his swordsman's calluses could transfer so easily to a farmer's but... a year of exile, living in the world according to Ozai, had certainly taught him things he'd never considered. He smelled the sweetening air, let the darkening earth run through his fingers every single morning, testing them, waiting for Katara's promises to achieve fruition. Waiting, to see if Azula really could reverse the destruction left in her father's wake.

Sokka hauled his tools back to the storage shed Toph had helped him build their first week in the wild together. A stone hut, it worked beautifully to keep the few tools they had found in outer Ba Sing Se pristine. He stood his hoe next to the glittering black blade he'd failed to use against Azula so long ago, smiled at the dust settling on its handle.

A gift from the Fire Queen, the note had said. Sokka looked at it, still tied to the handle, and read for the thousandth time the words scrawled in Azula's hand.

_If ever you think me a tyrant again, come back, and bring this with you. The invitation is always open, if you want to settle accounts this way. I will reserve one last Agni Kai for you; Suki thought this blade was enough for you to end me. But I know you, Sokka. You aren't a coward, you aren't a murderer. You are a warrior, and if fate decrees that we must fight, I know you will fight me like a man... just as I will fight you. Until then... let's see how your people survive under YOUR tyranny.  
_

"What are you doing, Snoozles?" Toph asked from the entrance, leaning against the doorframe with a bucket of water held against her growing belly. "Reading that thing again?"

Sokka chuckled at her, as he so often did in this seventh year.

"Well, whatever you're doing, hurry up. The last of the slaves are leaving Ba Sing Se, and we need to find a place to quarter them until we can settle on who lives where." Toph set the bucket down, breathing heavily out. "C'mon." She held out her hand.

And Sokka took it, and went with it, wherever it led, until the black sword lay forgotten under heaps of dust and dirt, and the sky burned blue once again.

* * *

Author's Note: Thank you all for your patience with this. I hope you enjoyed reading it, and especially The Writer Triumphant, for whom this mess of research and late nights is written.

* * *


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